This article broke my heart a bit. I say that because I am so passionate about education and I loved school as a child. It was my window to a better world in which I could use my mind and hone my skills. Despite this, I can relate to Fried’s (2001) explanation in that “kids have become adept at figuring our what they’re supposed to do,” and therefore they are not truly engaged in the work.
I have experienced this “game” many times in primary school. When I was in third grade, I can remember developing questions for a reading assignment with a partner. While we were working on the questions I remembered the teacher explaining that we must provide responses in our own words. My reading partner finished the assignment in 30 seconds. When I shared my answers with my reading partner, she said, “Oh I just re-write exactly what it says here in the paragraph.” Without using brain power, my partner had finished the assignment and received an A grade for her work. However, we cannot rest all of the blame on students for playing the game of school. We must recognized that it is logical that students will want to take the path of least resistance, to avoid engagement in something that is boring by finding alternate routes, whether or not they are the best routes.
Teachers are not exempt from playing the game. It goes without saying that part of a teacher’s job is to make sure that children are learning material and receiving quality engagement in the classroom. The game of teaching is made more difficult by teachers who are bogged down by things like testing demands, business-borne policies of administration and the jaded teachers that follow these systems. Teachers must find a way to unite and engage their students as a professional team.
They must recognize when the game of school is being played in the classroom. When children are asking irrelevant questions, or giving short answers, or goofing off in the classroom. This is part of how we can understand that they are not engaged and that the playing the game of school will become apparent.
Despite my intense love for learning and education, I too am guilty of the game of school. However, it was not until I reached university that I began the game. The demand of high work and large amount of multiple choice exams that are imposed in college warrant playing the game. As Fried (2001) explained in his article - and Diane Ravitch has explained multiple times - children will not benefit from an exam that tests one’s ability to guess the correct answer.
There is no question that the GOS defeats the purpose of quality education. However I believe that the ability to recognize that the GOS is being played is a step in the right direction of improving schools. Once we recognize the GOS phenomenon, we are better able to understand that abundant testing of students in evaluation of their teachers is a disadvantageous method of improving education as a whole. If all children and teachers are playing the game of school, how can we expect to learn anything about schools or collect data on schools from a set of multiple-choice exams? The logic follows that the same game played in the classroom, is the same game that is played on each of the state tests that are given as an inefficient quality improvement” method.
I have experienced this “game” many times in primary school. When I was in third grade, I can remember developing questions for a reading assignment with a partner. While we were working on the questions I remembered the teacher explaining that we must provide responses in our own words. My reading partner finished the assignment in 30 seconds. When I shared my answers with my reading partner, she said, “Oh I just re-write exactly what it says here in the paragraph.” Without using brain power, my partner had finished the assignment and received an A grade for her work. However, we cannot rest all of the blame on students for playing the game of school. We must recognized that it is logical that students will want to take the path of least resistance, to avoid engagement in something that is boring by finding alternate routes, whether or not they are the best routes.
Teachers are not exempt from playing the game. It goes without saying that part of a teacher’s job is to make sure that children are learning material and receiving quality engagement in the classroom. The game of teaching is made more difficult by teachers who are bogged down by things like testing demands, business-borne policies of administration and the jaded teachers that follow these systems. Teachers must find a way to unite and engage their students as a professional team.
They must recognize when the game of school is being played in the classroom. When children are asking irrelevant questions, or giving short answers, or goofing off in the classroom. This is part of how we can understand that they are not engaged and that the playing the game of school will become apparent.
Despite my intense love for learning and education, I too am guilty of the game of school. However, it was not until I reached university that I began the game. The demand of high work and large amount of multiple choice exams that are imposed in college warrant playing the game. As Fried (2001) explained in his article - and Diane Ravitch has explained multiple times - children will not benefit from an exam that tests one’s ability to guess the correct answer.
There is no question that the GOS defeats the purpose of quality education. However I believe that the ability to recognize that the GOS is being played is a step in the right direction of improving schools. Once we recognize the GOS phenomenon, we are better able to understand that abundant testing of students in evaluation of their teachers is a disadvantageous method of improving education as a whole. If all children and teachers are playing the game of school, how can we expect to learn anything about schools or collect data on schools from a set of multiple-choice exams? The logic follows that the same game played in the classroom, is the same game that is played on each of the state tests that are given as an inefficient quality improvement” method.